When one of India’s best-known public schools struggled to find a convincing principal from more than 200 applicants, it raised an uncomfortable question about how the country identifies and develops its school leaders.
A few years ago, some of us associated with this magazine were involved with the governing board of one of India’s leading schools, an institution with a history extending beyond 150 years. When a vacancy arose for principal, an advertisement was placed in the newspapers. Given the school’s reputation and the importance of the position, we expected applications from some of the country’s finest educators.
More than 200 people applied, many with 20 years or more in education. Surely, among so many experienced teachers and administrators, there would be several candidates with the knowledge, character and imagination required to lead a distinguished institution.
Yet scarcely two or three appeared promising enough to invite for a serious conversation. Most résumés listed qualifications, years of service and positions held, but communicated little about the person behind them. There was limited evidence of intellectual depth, educational purpose, originality or a compelling vision of what a school could become.
We were not merely looking for someone who could prepare timetables, conduct examinations, maintain records and satisfy regulators. We needed an educational leader who could guide teachers, shape the school’s culture, understand children, earn the confidence of parents and prepare the institution for the future.
Even some stronger applicants seemed impressive largely because of the institutions with which they were associated. The names of their schools lent weight to their applications. But if those names were removed, what remained? What had the applicants themselves built? Had they improved teaching, developed other educators or articulated an educational philosophy of their own?
This was only one recruitment exercise at one institution. It would be unfair to treat it as evidence about every teacher or principal in India. Nevertheless, it left us with an uncomfortable question: where will we find the next generation of inspiring teachers and school leaders?
When we look back at our childhood, many of us remember teachers whose influence extended beyond the textbook. They appeared widely read and possessed an intellectual life outside their subjects. Their authority came not merely from their designation but from knowledge, character and a conviction that teaching mattered.
We must, of course, be careful about nostalgia. We may remember the few exceptional teachers and forget the ordinary ones. We may be comparing today’s entire teaching workforce with a selected gallery of the finest educators from our past. Even after allowing for this, however, a concern remains: why do institutions still struggle to find educators with depth, imagination and leadership ability?
Beyond qualifications and seniority
Part of the answer may lie in what the system recognises. Schools can easily record degrees, certificates, examination results and years of service. These may all be relevant, but none establishes by itself that someone is an inspiring teacher or capable leader.
An educator may possess every required qualification and yet have stopped reading seriously. A teacher may attend numerous professional-development programmes without changing classroom practice. A principal may produce good examination results while creating a culture in which teachers are afraid to experiment and students are afraid to question. A résumé can document a career without revealing the quality of the mind behind it.
Experience, too, must mean more than the passage of time. Twenty years of continuous professional growth and one year repeated twenty times may appear similar on paper, but they are not the same.
The problem becomes particularly serious when schools appoint principals. A good teacher does not automatically become a good principal. Leadership also requires the ability to develop people, communicate clearly, resolve conflicts, make difficult decisions and unite a community around a shared purpose.
Yet school leadership is often treated as the eventual reward for seniority. A teacher accumulates years of service, becomes a coordinator or vice-principal and later applies to become principal. At no point may anyone have seriously examined whether that person can think independently, inspire colleagues or build an institution.
We reward conformity and later demand imagination. We discourage questioning and later ask for vision. We restrict teachers’ authority and then wonder why so few are prepared to exercise it responsibly. The problem may therefore not be that good teachers have disappeared, but that we have failed to identify, develop and retain them.
A young teacher may enter the profession with energy and curiosity, only to discover that every lesson has been predetermined and every departure from routine invites suspicion. Some leave. Others lower their expectations. Still others continue doing remarkable work quietly within whatever freedom they can find. These are the teachers whom schools must learn to see.
This need is equally urgent in government schools. India has talented and committed teachers working across villages, towns and cities, often in difficult circumstances. Yet layers of administration, transfers, inspections, local influence and political interference can overshadow teaching and learning. Where corruption, patronage or petty bureaucracy intrude, capable teachers may conclude that merit has little value.
Finding the leaders already among us
Every school must become better at recognising genuine teaching talent. Leaders must look beyond qualifications and years of service. They must enter classrooms, observe how teachers explain ideas, listen to the questions children ask and notice which educators continue to learn.
Such teachers should be allowed to lead projects, mentor colleagues, organise professional-learning groups and contribute meaningfully to school decisions. Leadership should not begin only when someone receives a designation; it should be cultivated throughout a teacher’s career.
Young teachers need room to grow without merely imitating their seniors. Experienced teachers, meanwhile, should not be dismissed as resistant to change. Schools should bring together the judgement of experienced educators and the energy and new ideas of younger colleagues.
The same seriousness must guide the selection of principals. Candidates should be asked what they believe education is for, how they have developed teachers, how they respond to failure and how they build trust. An impressive school name on a résumé should not substitute for individual achievement. Institutions can lend prestige to people, but education also needs people who add something to their institutions.
Good teachers have not disappeared. Many are already working in private and government schools, in large cities and remote communities, often without attention or recognition. They may be hidden behind ordinary designations, constrained by bureaucracy or silenced by hierarchy.
Our task is not to mourn for a lost generation of great teachers. It is to find the good teachers already among us and give them room to become great.
The future of Indian education may depend less on discovering one extraordinary leader from 200 applications than on creating schools in which hundreds of potentially extraordinary teachers are finally allowed to shine.
The ideas, opinions, and perspectives expressed in this editorial are those of the publication. AI-assisted tools may have been used to support research, drafting, and editing.